Unjournalism

I’m sick of hearing about how awesomely funny the videos starring the “Old Spice guy” are, and I really don’t need to hear an update on how many bajillions of times people watch the 200-some YouTube videos. They’re very funny and clever and, apparently, effective. I get it. (If your power has been out and you have no idea what I’m talking about, BusinessWeek has a good summary of this wildly popular campaign.)

You know what I’m not sick of? Discussion of why this campaign was such a home run. I haven’t heard much along these lines, even after actually seeking it out. So here’s my attempt at filling the void.

Why did the live-response “Old Spice guy” video campaign work so damn well?

• They’re building on the popularity of a character from a successful Super Bowl ad. The creative team didn’t simply fabricate a character and hope he would catch on; they had already developed some rapport and somewhat of a personality for the character.
• The brand gave up some control. A small team was tasked with everything from monitoring incoming online messages to script writing to video production. They sat in a room and pounded these out in a couple of days. When an opportunity arises, take a team you trust and let them do what they do best. Be creative, smart and fast. Don’t bog the process down with the typical ad production run-around. This program, and others like it I’m sure we’ll see in the coming months, wouldn’t succeed without this kind of speed, flexibility and freedom.
• It’s about more than just “talking to consumers.” That’s expected these days. But when a fictional character, one with a bit of cachet stemming from a popular Super Bowl ad, talks directly to real people, that’s unique. When you can see and hear that character in a video, watch him speak your name and answer your question, it’s profoundly more powerful than, say, having a character like the Burger King or the Pillsbury Dough Boy “talk to you” via Twitter — especially when you’re pretty sure the Dough Boy is just some recent college grad who’s referred to as “the Web guy” in the marketing department because he was the only one who had a Twitter account before the recent campaign started.
• The good old ego stroke is a powerful thing. When you make a video just for Ellen DeGeneres (see above) or Ashton Kutcher (one of the most popular Twitter users), you can pretty much bank on a some extra reach for those videos. “Hey, a guy with great abs and a lot of Internet fame is talking about me! Aren’t I cool? [link to your brand's marketing messages]“
• Isaiah Mustafa, the actor who plays “Old Spice guy,” is a handsome devil. And those abs!
• The video are just plain funny. These videos aren’t commercials with a hint of funny; they’re funny with a hint of commercial. And that’s all you need. People share funny stuff. Voluntarily.

This campaign helped push this brand — which is perceived to be an old guy’s product, though this 27-year-old has used it for years — to the forefront of popular culture in less than a week. Have you started brainstorming how your brand can create some similar magic?

This post was originally published on the Fast Horse blog, Idea Peepshow

Tags: marketing, social media // Add Comment »

In April, Facebook launched of a set of “social plug-ins” that let anyone put tools Facebook’s comment box and “Like” button on websites outside of Facebook. Just three weeks after these social plug-in tools were launched, more than 100,000 sites had installed the tools.

It was huge news in the worlds of technology and marketing. Not because it was the next big step for the social-networking giant. Not because it presented potentially huge privacy concerns for users of the service that has previously danced all over both sides of the line that separates respect for privacy from abusing users’ trust. And not because it gave geeks and marketers fun new toys to tinker with.

It was huge because it marked what was arguably the biggest stride to date toward what Charlene Li, a social media marketing analyst formerly with Forrester Research, described as a future in which online “social networks will be like air.” That is, the people and entities we’re connected to online and the things they share will surround us and be taken for granted — like air. Their presence will be the norm, not the exception. And if you think our social networks aren’t as crucial to our survival as air, ask the nearest psychology major about Maslow’s hierarchy.

Ubiquitous social networks are different from “everyone uses Facebook, dude.” It means tools for being social are built in to places you already are, things you’re already doing. You don’t have to go somewhere to be social. Before Facebook’s announcement, I would read news on cnn.com and visit facebook.com to see what my friends were reading and sharing. Today, I visit cnn.com and see the big feature story, a list of latest-news headlines and a list of headlines for CNN articles my friends (as defined by the connections I’ve made on Facebook) have read and liked.

On levi.com, the clothing maker shows me how many friends and which friends like the jeans I’m looking at. The social-fueled site also reminds me about my friends’ upcoming birthdays and any Levi products they might like — just in case I’m inspired to pick out a gift. I don’t need to go anywhere or do anything to take advantage of these social elements. With Facebook’s recent developments, my friends are always with me. And the potential uses for this social ubiquity are limitless.

This puts two crucial and very different methods for information gathering and filtering side by side: I see stories or products deemed relevant or significant by a well-informed and -trained professional gatekeeper alongside items my friends deemed interesting, entertaining, shocking or otherwise worthy of sharing. And of course, my friends likely share at least some of my interests and certainly capture my attention more easily than some anonymous editor.

Friends, in the “real world” and online (which, of course, isn’t real, right?), make everything better. When I see a funny YouTube video, my first inclination is to share it with friends. When I’m moved by a great song, I want my friends to have an opportunity to experience the feeling, too. When my kid does something cute or funny (daily!), I want my friends and family to share in the fun. When one of my friends writes a compelling blog post, I like to do him or her the favor of helping spread the word as much as possible. These “social plug-ins” from Facebook will make that impulse easier and more natural to act upon, arguably more so than any other development since the advent of Facebook itself.

So what does this mean for companies trying to communicate effectively in this social media-obsessed landscape? Think about ways in which you can create things — products, videos, events, blog posts, experiences — people want to share with their friends. Better yet, what can you do to honestly make people want to be friends with you? I’ll spare you the clichés about this being the era of conversational marketing or that “content is king” and so on, but I will tell you this: If people don’t like you, you’re going to have trouble liking your results.

This post originally appeared on the Idea Peepshow, my employer’s blog

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Well, maybe that’s not true, but she was onto something: Remember when your mom told you, “If you don’t have anything nice to say, don’t say anything at all?” Same idea applies to hosting comment discussions on news sites.

Have you ever noticed the relatively low quality of the comments readers leave on stories on your daily newspaper’s Web site — or on a hugely popular site like YouTube? They’re usually just this side of worthless, and, in the case of YouTube, they’re often some of the most mindless, meaningless drivel you’ve ever wasted eye power on.

In the case of news sites, Robert Niles at the Online Journalism Review blames the reporters themselves and their publishers, not the commenters who often can’t seem to string together anything more coherent than four pre-written partisan talking points glued together by a few hard-working conjunctions. He makes I point I’d tend to agree with: If you, the news organization, can’t manage a comment discussion, don’t bother having one. Just shut if off.

Not only that, but when it comes to doing the work of managing that discussion, it’s not a task to be left to an “online editor” or someone who simply deletes any comment that drops an F-bomb (keep an eye on our recent vice presidents). The person best suited to manage the discussion, to keep the discussion meaningfully on track, to even learn from that discussion, is the writer of the story.

Niles is onto something here. Read his piece for a taste of what online news could be like, and imagine your favorite local reporter really being a part of the crowd — which I’ve written about when discussing Minneapolis’ own Jason DeRusha. But note that Niles isn’t being weighed down by technical minutiae:

Notice that I’ve written nothing about anonymous comments. Or whether comments should be held for review before publication. That’s not because I don’t care about those issues, or don’t have an opinion. I do. But I’ve also found that an individual publication’s stand on those issues doesn’t determine whether it manages its comment community successfully or not. I’ve seen great discussions with and without anonymous posters. As well as lousy ones. I’ve seen great conversations both with and without prior review. And lousy ones, too.

Same goes for blogs. I’ve watched many great blogs get too big too quick, and the comment discussions devolve into nothingness. It’s hard work to keep a discussion interesting when you start to get several dozen comments deep. But don’t shy away from the work. “[O]n newspaper websites, when the article goes up, that’s the end of the production process,” Niles wrote, “On community-focused websites, when the article goes up, that’s the beginning.”

Tags: journalism, social media // 1 Comment »

Wow. Has it really been…? Geez.

With the beginning of the new year (I know it’s February already; shut up), I’m taking some time at work to set some goals for the year ahead. Some goals that pertain specifically to “personal marketing” and others, arguably more interesting or more important, that pertain to how I hope to better myself and the agency in the coming the months. These are goals that I will create and assign to myself, not goals that are put upon me — though my colleagues can and will shape them.

It’s a bit daunting to start with a blank sheet of paper — or a blank Word document, as it were — tasked with pulling meaningful goals out of the ether and, after some polishing, committing to them. I like it, though. I find that I’m now putting to paper things I’ve been meaning to do, wanting to do, hoping to do for some time. Now I have a reason.

The list is still in the works, but as it stands, there are some of the thing I’m thinking about:

• Taking all things “social media” to the next level. Many clients will still need the fundamental strategies and services we’ve always delivered, but I’m always looking toward what’s next, what’s beyond the basic.
• Finding new ways or new platforms — online and off — to help my team share ideas, brainstorm, document best practices, relay personal and professional news, show off their success stories, and so on. Is there an organization on earth that couldn’t stand to do these things better?
• Make more meaningful connections. My online activity enables my offline relationships and vice versa. I need to find more rocket fuel to pour on both of those fires. Make ‘em go boom.
• Use the snooze button less. This isn’t some sort of marketing metaphor; I really need to just get the hell out of bed in the morning.

How about you? What do you want to accomplish this year?

[photo]

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A recent episode of the For Immediate Release podcast — I believe it was show 486 — included a discussion about worms on Twitter and the connection with the (in)security of shortened URLs shared online. As FIR co-host Shel Holtz alluded to, even if you trust the sender or sharer of a shortened URL, those links — which mask the destination with a simpler, shorter tinyurl.com or bit.ly address — are fraught with danger. Or, at least, potential danger.

This is something I’ve discussed more than once with my friend and local code wizard Garrick Van Buren. He’s built his own URL shortener, grv.me, that he uses to share stuff he creates. He’s done the same for MinnPost.com with its minnpo.st URL shortener, which the local news outfit uses to share its own stories on Twitter and the like.

Why? Trust. When you see a TinyURL, you have no idea what the link is going to point you to. Viruses, spyware, porn and all sorts of other unwanted or inappropriate stuff are just a click away. Sure, there are some tricks to help alleviate that problem, but what if you actually could trust a shortened URL?

That’s there grv.me and minnpo.st come in. Once you’re familiar with them — once their respective publishers introduce you to them — you can trust them as much as you trust their publishers. Because you know only Garrick can create grv.me URLs, there’s no virus at the other end. Coke, a client of ours, also created its own URL shortener — with trust being one factor and, I’m sure, the desire to control the technology rather than rely on someone else’s as another factor. (though we had nothing to do with the creation of this tool).

The need for safety and security online will not go away. Don’t worry: Smart people like Garrick will be here to help.

Photo courtesy of zach_manchester on Flickr

Tags: Web, security // 8 Comments »

Last night I found myself rereading Julio Ojeda-Zapata‘s “Twitter Means Business,” a book that does a damn good job of fulfilling the mission laid out in its subtitle, explaining “how microblogging can help or hurt your company.”

Yes, rereading. Not solely for the content, which in large part is a deeper dive into many of the corporate case studies we new-media pundits are often already somewhat familiar with, but for the inspiration.

I happen to know many of the very smart people who contributed to and who are quoted in Julio’s book (bragging: I happen to be one of them), and I remember watching many of these case study scenarios unfold in real life — not knowing they’d be business-book material a few months later.

Some of these people I know very well. Albert Maruggi, who contributed the book’s afterword, is a dear friend and former colleague who lives about eight blocks away from me. Others, I know in that familiar but distant “we’ve met on Twitter” sense. I remember when Jennifer Leggio, who wrote the book’s forward, was asking for help on Twitter while setting up her first WordPress blog.

I remember reading the first TechCrunch post about Comcast and its use of Twitter as a customer service tool the day it was published and thinking, Man, I really dislike Comcast, but that’s awesome. Julio’s “book praise” page is a damn who’s-who of people I’ve befriended, attended conferences with, twittered at and otherwise bumped into — digitally or in the flesh. Hell, even Julio himself is a friend of mine and a person whose work I’ve followed for years.

Something about that closeness to my life, that proximity to what I live and breathe everyday, takes Julio’s book far beyond the realm of ideas. We’re now squarely in the realm of pure inspiration.

Rereading this book, though I’m only a few pages in, inspires me to try harder. To continue to try to new things. To pay more attention to my friends and the things going on around me. To keep my head up and watch for new opportunities rather than keep my head down and plow away at the same old work in the same old way.

Thanks, Julio — and thanks to everyone else who made this book happen.

Tags: reading, social media // 1 Comment »

Actual headline from MySpace news release: “MySpace Reduces Staff by Nearly 30%”

Actual sub-head from same release: “Return to Start-Up Culture a Focus for Company Moving Forward”

“Return to start-up culture”? What does that mean? Well, beyond the fact that a few hundred people will lose their jobs, it means the folks responsible for this news release are either a bit delusional or not afraid of being laughed at. It couldn’t be easier to see right through this transparent bullshit.

No sane person believes MySpace wanted to can 30 percent of its staff. That MySpace actually thought it was desireable. Sure, you can put a little polish on that turd of a headline, but trying to turn into elective good news screams “BS.” Do you really think someone within the company decided, “Hey, this growth looks nice and all, but we’re a little bloated. What do you say we axe a third of you people to get back to our roots? Who’s with me?”

This writing is what critics of public relations professionals’ work refer to as “spin.” The fact that some PR pros seem to get away with over-the-line stuff like this reflects poorly on all of us. If you ever have a chance, do your best to stop this crap in its tracks.

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Those of you who pay somewhat closer attention to me than others know that I have a new job. I’m doing rather similar work to what I did at my previous gig — helping clients understand how to put the power the of the Web to good use and helping them communicate more effectively — just in a new environment and with new people. “New people” as in “new to me”; it’s not at all the case that these folks were born yesterday.

Anyway, the reason I’m talking about this is because it’s probably going to affect what I do here. Not it a bad way — I’m not being censored for the sake of corporate politics or anything like that. It’s just that:

A) I’ve been busy as I work to get my legs under me at the new gig and

B) I’m excited about doing some writing for the agency’s own blog, which has some serious thematic overlap, if you will, with Unjournalism.

I have no intention of stopping writing here at Unjournalism — or anywhere else I write, for that matter. I do, however, have to put some good brain power into determining how I can best accommodate all of my online homes without too much overlap but still keeping each relevant and interesting.

In the meantime, there’s not a creature or employer alive who can stop me from Twittering, apparently, so you can get all the Mike you can handle over there.

So bear with me. I promise not to suck.

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Are the services of a public relations professional a privilege for those with enough money — or ego, or both — to afford it? Or is it, in one way or another, a right that should be afforded to each of us in our respective times of need?

I’ve thought about this from time to time, most recently in the context of the story of Nadya Suleman, the mother of a rather notorious set of octuplets. Simply by nature of the rarity of her, uh, feat — having given birth to only the country’s second set of live octuplets — she was thrust into the public eye, though at first unnamed.

At that point, even before she was identified and before we heard rumors of a book deal or a (god, help us) reality television show, folks coast to coast (and beyond, I’m sure) were discussing the whys and hows of giving birth to eight little critters and, in many cases, passing judgment. How could she? Why would she? Should she? Is she, or will she be receiving some sort of welfare or other public assistance?

At some point along the way, Ms. Suleman picked up the services of a PR firm — pro bono. In a sick turn of events, those PR pros have stepped down after having reportedly received death threats. That’s terrible and unfortunate, and it reminds me of high-profile cases in which certain lawyers receive similar treatment. What did the PR folks do wrong? Isn’t it at least as likely, if not more so, that they’re trying to do some good than they’re simply being opportunistic? And even if you believe they’re a little attention-hungry or whatever, death threats?!

Not that PR people need any more comparisons to lawyers (see the joke Shel shares here), but Ms. Suleman’s story really has me thinking (so I can get on with the point of my post, now that I have the context out of the way): Most folks I know believe in the fundamental importance of adequate legal representation when on trial in a court of law. But what about when someone is thrust into a trial in the court of public opinion? Isn’t a person entitled to the services of someone who can help them in their time of need?

To be clear, when I say “entitled,” I don’t necessarily mean they should get it for free. I don’t foresee, desire or expect a “public reputation defender” who functions as the PR equivalent of the court-appointed public defender. I do, however, believe that having your side of the story heard is something to which you’re entitled, and sometimes that requires professional help.

Photo courtesy of mindgutter on Flickr

Tags: ethics, public relations // 8 Comments »

Please read this.

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